October is one of those months around here that is constantly so busy, it just flies by. Between soccer, birthdays, Fall Festivals, kids excitement building to Halloween….well I can’t believe it is already the 20th! Last week I worked quite a bit on a to-be-seen-later quilt. In the meantime, you can see the color palette in my trimmings above. I changed out my rotary blade and it was like quilter’s Christmas. So smooth! Every time I put in a fresh blade I wonder what took me so long.

I also finished my son’s skeleton costume last week. We took them for a spin at a local kids night of games and they were a hit! For the skeleton, I bought black sweatpants and a black long sleeved shirt at Old Navy. I went to Google to find a skeleton template and used this one from Country Living. I resized it to fit his shirt and pants dimensions, then cut out the pieces and traced them onto white wool felt. I decided to make the costume have bones on the front and back, so I changed the rib cage a bit for the back.

I ironed Heat n Bond Ultrahold to the wool felt and followed the directions to apply them to the black clothing. I went to Party City for the hat and gloves. (It’s funny how growing up in southern Ohio, having a warm costume for Halloween was less important than being in Chicago!) He’s very happy with how it turned out!

Totally switching topics – but does anyone here get Uppercase Magazine? It’s a bit of a splurge for me, but I really enjoy it. (I was sold after seeing the cover of the last issue.) So, this is the second issue I’ve received and I was flipping through and saw a spread on Bookhou. I was so excited because I love my Bookhou bag so much! The quality and design are really just beautiful, and it was awesome to see them featured. Maybe something for your wish lists with the holiday’s coming up?

I can’t believe it, but I finished my daughters Halloween costume way early! I don’t think I’ve ever made her a costume for Halloween in all 8 years. But not long ago I pinned some costume ideas on Pinterest and she really loved these bird wings.

I followed the general idea on both this website and this website (this second link for the headpiece as well). I didn’t worry about making each wing a perfect 1/4 circle. I measured the length of her arm and the length down her back. I cut a rectangle that size and then just eyeballed a curved line between the two.

I want her to be able to put the costume on by herself for her school party, so I used some sparkly black elastic about 3/4″ thick that I found at JoAnns for the arm holds. It’s not too tight for her and there is nothing for her to tie (or really, for her teacher to tie).

For the headpiece, I followed the general instructions here. (But again, I didn’t make it tie, just sized it to her head.) The ribbon is Renaissance Ribbons by Anna Maria Horner. I’ve had them forever! Happy to finally use them.

The wings at headpiece use a variety of fabrics (handpicked by my daughter) and wool felt. I love wool felt, it is such good quality compared to craft felt from big box craft stores. It comes in so handy for craft projects. One of my sponsors even carries some in her shop – Fabric Spark!

My daughter love, love, loves it. **I know I generally ask you not to Pin pictures with my kids on Pinterest, but feel free to Pin any of these Halloween costume photos.** Now to finish my son’s costume. He has a much simpler request – a skeleton.

Not quilting related, but my kids had off school Thursday and Friday so we decided to have a little fun in Chicago. We took a day trip Friday to the Art Institute. I had my kids bring sketchpads and colored pencils, and they spent the day finding their favorite artwork and recreating it themselves.

This is such a fun way for kids to experience art museums. It makes them really look at the artwork and not just walk on by, bored after a couple rooms. It doesn’t matter AT ALL if they are artistically gifted. It makes them notice details in the paintings that they would have missed otherwise. The staff in each room allowed them to sit on the floor if benches weren’t around. I think the only time in the past we were not allowed to do this was in special exhibit areas (too crowded).

We are so spoiled to have all these awesome works of art practically in our backyard. The fact that we can drive 45 minutes and then spend our day surrounded by Monet and Picasso and Matisse…just incredibly lucky. I knew my daughter would have fun (we’ve done this before), but this is the first time I’ve brought my 5 year old – very active – son. He LOVED it. He wanted to draw everything he saw. He was so calm and concentrated so hard, he did not want to leave at the end of our time there.

I definitely recommend checking out the Art Institute, even with young kids, if you are ever in Chicago. We only made it through 3 sections – Impressionism, Modern American Art 1900-1950 and Modern Art (3rd floor in the modern wing) so we will be back to explore more soon.

I hope you aren’t tired of seeing these blocks, but I have good news for you if you are. These are the final few! I am done with the paper piecing and will be completing the quilt top and quilting this week. I’m really excited to share with you the finished quilt soon ~ and the story about how I came up with the blocks and design.

Last week I had a big delivery on my front porch – many, many, many copies of my paper patterns. I am happy to announce I’ve been picked up by a few wholesale distributors (Brewer, Checker, and E.E. Schenck Co.). If you are a shop owner and buy through one of these companies, I hope you will consider carrying my pattern line. They are already listed at Brewer, Checker (search Fresh Lemons Quilts as the Vendor) and hopefully will be up soon at E.E. Schenck Co. And for you non shop owners, you can still buy patterns (paper and PDF) in my online shop here on the blog.

I spent a bit of time yesterday working with my daughter on her Halloween costume. She really likes these bird wings (found here and here). I usually don’t really make costumes – I know, I know. But this one seemed pretty straight forward and we are able to make it together. She of course picked out 2 of my most hoarded out of print fabrics (the orange Henna Garden by Sandi Henderson and the Pink Coriander by Amy Butler). Looks good in the wings though! If we don’t mess the project up too much, I’ll share the finished costume here next month.

I’m back with my finished Halloween quilt! This turned out to be a fun quilt to put together and even though it’s not October yet, I’ve already set it out in the family room.

I mentioned in my last post that I used my Prism pattern for this quilt. I did shrink the blocks down a bit…not sure why – ha! That’s what happens when I finish a quilt a year after I start it. It probably has something to do with the limited amount of fabric I had (only fat quarters of the Nightshade prints and only fat 1/8ths of the Oakshott cottons). These blocks ended up 6″ finished. The quilt measures about 48″ x 54″.

I quilted with a meandering free motion design. I did a pretty wide spaced meandering, hoping it will wash up a bit less stiff than a tighter quilting pattern.

The backing is two of my favorite prints from the Nightshade line. The binding is the left over from one of the backing prints.

Overall I think this is a great quilt for Halloween without screaming “Orange and Black!”